Protest of Workers in B & H Federation

By Hana Barjraktarevic, AIM Sarajevo, 26 October 1999

Instead of “Green” Spring—“Red”
Autumn

While prime minister of the Federation of Bosnia &
Herzegovina Edhem Bicakcic was opening the bridge in Aleksin
Han near Jablanica 40 days before its completion had been
planned, more than 30 thousand workers from parts of B&H
Federation with Bosniac majority population demanded “bread
because we are hungry”. Workers from parts with Croat majority
population were not there—they do not have an organised
trade union organisation except in the Aluminium Combine in
Mostar.

On 25 October, a protest gathering of workers,
pensioners, demobilised combatants and disabled veterans was
held in Sarajevo. They were forced into the street by
unemployment, irregularly paid and small salaries, unpaid
retirement and disability insurance, uncertainty of those who
have the status of “waiting for work”. Presence of 50 thousand
workers was expected at this gathering. But, although just
this smaller number of workers were there, supported by
members of the trade union primarily from the Republic of
Srpska, but also from France, Belgium, Montenegro, Slovenia,
Croatia and also the International, European and World
Confederation of Trade Unions, the workers stated their
demands and set deadlines for them to be met.

The first demand of the workers is that the Labour Law
be published in the next issue of the Official Gazette of B&H
Federation (one of the pretexts for the failure to publish
this Law was—lack of paper!?). They also demanded a social
welfare program with ensured financing (time limit 30 days),
signing of the general collective contract with B&H trade
union (within 15 days), and branch collective contracts with
branch trade unions (within 30 days), reduction of taxes and
contributions levied on salaries—immediately, and payment of
unpaid salaries and contributions for social and health
insurance, also immediately… It was demanded that until the
end of the year at the latest, the governments and parliaments
on all levels adopt programs of economic development in which
it would be explicitly determined that the biggest share of
the money be invested in production and increase of
employment, that privatisation be revised and all purchase
deals that may have been illegal be nullified. Meeting of
these demands should begin immediately and be a permanent
task. It was demanded that work be intensified of all relevant
institutions on revealing and publishing names of those who
are becoming rich thanks to bribery and corruption and then
property acquired in this way, be immediately confiscated.

“Workers agree to privatisation, but not to plunder…
The failure of the authorities to meet the justified demands
of the workers will result in a ‘hot winter’ and early
parliamentary elections”, said president of B&H Trade Union
Sulejman Hrle. To the directors who had prevented the workers
of their enterprises to come to the gathering in Sarajevo he
sent word that they were “tiny little mice” and that they
would lose their posts, that none of the local power wielders
and feudalists would save them. Apart from Hrle, the workers
were addressed by representatives of cantonal trade unions,
but there were no workers among the speakers. Their voices
were registered only by the media: “It cannot go on like this
any more, we are more often hungry than we are full”, a large
number of the interviewed strikers said. At the same time they
observed that they could hardly change anything with the
protest gathering: “It does not depend on us, others make
decisions for us, but perhaps this gathering will help us get
at least some hope”, workers said far from the microphone on
the platform.

Federal prime minister who was expected to give most
of the answers did not address the workers—he had said a
long time ago that he would not come. A few days before that
he declared that never had he seen similar protests except
perhaps once in Poland. He stated that the ministers in the
government of B&H Federation should decide for themselves
whether they would appear at the gathering, and to directors
that there would be no free bus transportation, nor special
trains for discontented workers if they were not paid for in
advance. He also demanded engagement of the Ministry of
Internal Affairs in checking whether everything had been paid
for. Organisers of the gathering then replied to the prime
minister that he might as well give an answer where the money
came from for the daily allowances of the ministers when
sessions of the government were held outside Sarajevo or
whether the Ministry of the interior was engaged to check
whether ministers and their deputies paid their own travelling
expenses when they travelled to the sessions in Mostar or
whether they did it with the money from the budget. As
concerning their—workers' transportation to Sarajevo—they
had collected a part of the money on their own and a part was
donated to them by the World Trade Union Movement.

But, not only the federal prime minister, but nobody
else from the authorities of the state of B&H or the entity of
the Federation either addressed the workers. Only the
unconstitutional co-chairman of the Council of Ministers of
B&H, Haris Silajdzic, from a business trip from somewhere,
sent a telegram of support. There was a rumour that the
Bosniac member of B&H Presidency was ready to meet the
workers, allegedly he wanted to rebuke them, but after his
principled approval, the organisers did not invite Alija
Izetbegovic again. According to one source, he had even set
out to go to the gathering, but the organisers recommended him
not to come because his appearance could be understood as an
act of political marketing. Indeed, the workers themselves, or
rather B&H Trade Union, just a few days prior to the
gathering, sent word to political and party leaders that they
did not wish to have them at their gathering—because it was
not a political gathering and they did not wish to be used as
a propagandist testing range for anybody. At the same time
rumour goes that local party leaders of the ruling Party of
Democratic Action (SDA) saw trade unionists off from their
towns to Sarajevo with threats and labelling them as the “red
gang” and similar.

In the end of the day, it appeared as if nothing had
happened and as if the workers had come out for a pleasant
holiday walk. Prime minister Bicakcic declared for a Sarajevo
newspaper that he had heard the workers' demands precisely and
concisely presented for the first time in media reports from
the gathering in Sarajevo: “We would have responded earlier
had we received specific demands instead of general
complaints”, prime minister said and added something that
could have meant that there had actually been no need to go
into the street because activities of the government were
moving in the direction of the workers' demands. He said that
a contract would be signed with branch trade unions, that the
labour law would be published “according to the scheduled
time-table”, and that the government was already considering
reduction of the contributions on salaries and talks had
started about reduction of taxes. He also said that legal
privatisation would reveal illegal acts, and abuses would then
be punished. Bicakcic announced a demand for reconstruction of
the Trade Union, probably just to pull rank. He also made it
clear that he had done all kinds of important things in
Aleksin Han—he had visited the road toward Blagaj which was
under construction and which was an investment of the
Kuwaitees of 10 million US dollars, and he had visited the
Serbs, the Croats and the Bosniacs who were returning to their
homes in the Herzegovina-Neretva Canton. As if they were
returning on only that very day and never again!

Those who had predicted that spring this year would be
marked by workers' and social revolt and unrest were late in
their forecasts for six months. A new strike has been
scheduled to take place in Sarajevo which is expected to
gather 35 thousand discontented workers of the textile,
leather and footwear industries: “We will demand to be told
what funds the motor pool, mobile phones and entertainment
allowances are paid from while we are starving, whether from
the fund for the management's salaries or from the budget”,
textile workers said in the announcement of their strike.
After that, new strikes should be expected—the workers'
discontent could turn into a final showdown with those in
power who have through the war and the postwar period brought
Bosnia to where it is now—on the verge of nothing and on the
road to nowhere.